by Joyce Porter
This plea for understanding didn’t soften MacGregor’s heart. He reckoned that any young copper who hadn’t gone through his baptism of fire as Dover’s assistant didn’t know the half of it. Let ’em try trailing around with Scotland Yard’s most unwanted man and see how they liked it! Good grief, MacGregor could tell stories that would bring tears to the eyes of the most case-hardened coppers. Stories of degradation, humiliation, frustration, consternation, embarrassment. . .
Gradually, and in spite of everybody’s individual preoccupations, the atmosphere in the police car grew lighter. MacGregor grumbled himself into a better mood and Elvira was really enjoying just sitting there and looking out of the window without having all those pedals and gears and switches and things to worry about. Dover, of course, was as contented as a pig in muck. He’d polished off the remnants of his lunch and was now about to treat himself to a well-earned nap. Sagging back like a half-filled sack of King Edwards, he gave a belch of pure contentment and closed his eyes.
After a few miles, Osmond leaned forward and spoke softly so as not to disturb Dover. ‘How did you come to identify Knapper so quickly?’ he asked. ‘I mean, one minute the papers are full of a badly disfigured, unidentified body and the next bloody minute there you lot are, waving your truncheons and kicking old Pettitt’s door in.’ He chuckled. ‘God, you put the wind up him, all right! He’ll be wetting his pants for weeks! Mrs Hall, now, – well, she’s a different kettle of fish. Takes more than a couple of rough-necked coppers to ruffle her feathers.’
MacGregor glanced severely at Osmond’s image in the rear mirror. ‘We didn’t even try,’ he said stiffly. ‘We’re only making preliminary enquiries. There’s no point in leaning on anybody at this stage.’
Osmond snorted sceptically. ‘Now pull the other one!’ he invited. ‘I’m not one of the mugs out there, you know. You don’t have to tell me what happens when a bunch of cops go round asking a few routine questions. Bloody murder! And you toffs from the Murder Squad are no better than anybody else. You go around putting the fear of God into folks for kicks like the rest of us.’
MacGregor maintained a prim silence.
‘Anyhow,’ – Osmond seemed unaware that his observations might have caused offence – ‘you still haven’t told me how you got onto it being Knapper so quick.’
MacGregor couldn’t see that the revelation of a few minor details about the identification of a murder victim could do much harm. It might even do some good by constituting a favour which one day would have to be repaid. ‘We were lucky,’ he admitted. ‘It seems that shortly before he died Knapper managed to swallow one of those little plastic, blue bead things they use instead of cash at the Rankin’s Holiday Ranches.’
Osmond nodded. ‘The Funny Money? I remember. God, the chap who thought up that racket deserves a medal! And a ten-year stretch on the Moor! Blimey, I reckon we were paying at least double for a pint of beer. Still . . .’ He remembered that it was the tax-payer who was picking up the bill and stopped feeling quite so aggrieved. ‘So, old Knapper managed to swallow a bead, did he? Well, well, he must have had more gumption than I gave him credit for. And more imagination. But,’ – he frowned thoughtfully at the back of MacGregor’s head – ‘there must have been millions of people with access to those beads at one time or another. You can’t have had time to process everybody.’
‘Actually, there aren’t as many as you might think,’ said MacGregor, continuing to drive along smoothly and steadily. ‘The Funny Money patterns are changed every season and each Holiday Ranch has its own individual set.’
Osmond nodded. ‘To stop counterfeiting? Yes, I did wonder myself if it might be worth trying to make your own.’
‘In those circumstances it didn’t take us long to narrow things down to Bowerville-by-the-sea. Even then, we might have had quite a job on our hands if it hadn’t been for the venison.’
‘Oh, that venison! I’d forgotten that. Saturday lunch, wasn’t it? I suppose it’s not something they dish up very often.’
‘Only for that one particular meal, as it happens. Fortunately for us. Once we’d got that far, it wasn’t too difficult to home in on this Dockwra Society.’
‘And that led you straight to our charismatic leader, Mr Pettitt, and he pointed the finger at Knapper?’
‘Well, Knapper more or less picked himself. Even with a rather unhelpful photograph of the corpse, it was pretty clear which one of you it was. Then we got in touch with Mrs Knapper and she clinched the identification.’
‘Easy when you know how, eh?’ Osmond leaned forward until his mouth was only an inch or so from MacGregor’s ear. ‘And then you decided your murderer must be a member of the Dockwra Society as well?’
‘The evidence does appear to be pointing in that direction,’ agreed MacGregor cautiously. ‘Of course, we’re keeping an open mind.’
‘Of course.’
MacGregor felt it was his turn to ask a question. ‘Did Pettitt ring you up and warn you that we were coming?’
‘I’d have had his guts for garters if he hadn’t.’
‘And Mrs Hall, too?’
‘She guessed I was probably the next on your list and gave me a tinkle to let me know what I was in for.’ Osmond refrained from further comment and, sitting back, slipped a hand into an inside pocket. ‘Do you smoke, sarge?’
‘Not while I’m driving, thanks.’
‘You can give me one!’
Dover, showering dandruff like a bride showers confetti, came out of his catnap as though summoned by the Last Trump. His dictum – that there’s some good in everybody – had once again proved correct. Even this sadistic, trigger-happy, stinking young punk had got cigarettes to hand round. And what nice big fat ones!
Dover’s greedy fingers inadvertently fumbled not one but two cigarettes out of the proffered packet, but he had a solution for every social solecism. With an easy grin he stuck the extra fag behind his ear. ‘I’ll keep that for later!’ he quipped.
It is not everybody who would contemplate with equanimity the prospect of placing something in his mouth which had been behind Dover’s ear, but Dover wasn’t quite so fussy.
Osmond could find no response to all this and had to content himself with getting out his lighter and flipping it as close as he dared under Dover’s nose.
Nothing happened.
Dover sniggered.
Osmond flicked the lighter again. Sparks flew and the wick seemed to singe a little, but that was all.
‘Damn!’ said Osmond. ‘I was just going to fill it when you two arrived,’ he explained, making excuses like a naughty schoolboy. ‘That’s the trouble with this model. Mechanically they’re very simple and they’re totally reliable, but they do use a hell of a lot of petrol.’
Dover chalked this up as one to himself and appealed to the rest of the company. ‘Anybody got a bloody match?’
The afternoon was already drawing in when they finally arrived at their destination. MacGregor judged that they were at a spot roughly equidistant from Osmond’s bed-sitter in one direction and London in the other. For all Dover knew, on the other hand, they might have landed on the moon – and Elvira’s bump of location wasn’t much better. However, even this unobservant duo did realise that the car had been halted in the darkest and most remote corner of an enormous car park.
On the distant horizon a huge rectangular slab of a building hunched upwards into the sky, many of its multitude of windows already glowing bright against the encroaching gloom. Osmond marched them towards this Mecca at a spanking pace which did little to endear him further to Dover. Elvira had removed her cap and covered up her uniform with a civilian raincoat. She now looked as normal and unobtrusive as any other girl blessed with long blonde hair, a 39:21:38 figure, and a wiggle.
Dover, with MacGregor in frustrated attendance, dropped further and further behind on this long march across the ruts and puddles and boulders of the car park. ‘Where the hell are we?’ he demanded as he picked his way fretfully
round one of the bigger potholes.
MacGregor gave him his best guess on that subject.
‘But what’s this dump?’ Dover flapped an exhausted hand at the twenty-storey building which, true to the nature of its kind, was getting no bloody nearer.
The building was adorned with a simply colossal illuminated sign which, in the circumstances, MacGregor felt he could do no better than read out to his lord and master. ‘It’s a Houston Hostelry, sir. One of that new chain of American-style hotels they’ve been opening up and down the country.’
‘’Strewth!’ said Dover for no particular reason. ‘What the hell are we doing here?’
‘I suppose this is where we’re going to have our meeting with
Osmond’s boss, sir.’
Dover stopped to have a little rest. ‘Who’s Osmond?’ he asked.
The Houston Hostelries were the latest word in do-it-yourself hotel keeping. The only human being that guests had any contact with was the young lady receptionist who accepted the payments in advance for the rooms, and she didn’t encourage the development of any more meaningful relationship. Everything else was pre-packed, obtained from a slot-machine, and sanforised. Still, on the plus side, there was no tipping and the hotel was not ungenerous when it came to providing tea bags, instant coffee, powdered milk and strips of paper for cleaning your shoes with.
Osmond didn’t even bother going to the reception desk. Instead, he moved over to a large board on which were displayed letters and messages for the clientele. He found an envelope marked ‘Mr Trill’ and ripped it open. Written on the inside of the envelope were two numbers. Osmond carefully added seventeen to each number in his head, checked his calculations twice, memorised the results and, only then, tore the envelope into tiny fragments and slipped them into his pocket.
Dover, MacGregor and Elvira watched in awe.
‘Follow me!’ ordered Osmond crisply and led the way over to the lifts. They were whisked up to the seventh floor where, with only a couple of furtive but penetrating glances over his shoulder, Osmond conducted them down the length of a long corridor and tapped elaborately upon a bedroom door.
It must have been a pre-determined code. The door opened, though whoever opened it was careful to remain out of sight. Osmond stood back so that Elvira could go in first. It wasn’t some last vestige of olde-worlde courtsey: it was a trap. As soon as she was across the threshold, the door closed with sinister speed.
Osmond failed to reassure Dover and MacGregor with a self-satisfied nod. ‘She’ll be de-sensitized separately,’ he explained as he moved on to the neighbouring bedroom door.
There was yet another bout of complicated tapping and Dover, for one, put poor Elvira and her fate right out of his mind while he indulged in a few anxious quivers about his own immediate future. ’Strewth, he thought unhappily as he gazed up and down the long deserted corridor, they could just disappear here without a trace! Nobody knew they were here. Nobody’d seen them come into this blooming hotel and a kid of two could make certain that nobody saw them going out. A couple of cabin trunks – and Bob’s your bloody uncle!
When the bedroom door opened, Dover, although naturally dying to take all the weight off his feet, went through with considerable reluctance.
Once again, whoever opened the door took good care to remain out of sight until the three of them – Dover, MacGregor and Osmond — were well inside the room.
‘Good afternoon, gentlemen! I am Sven.’
More undulating than walking, the man who had spoken moved away from the door. He was extremely tall, extremely thin and noticeably willowy. Hospitably he stretched out a hand in which every bone seemed twice the normal length.
Osmond quickly made the introductions. ‘This is Detective Chief Inspector Dover, sir, and this is Detective Sergeant MacGregor. Both from the Murder Squad, of course.’
‘Delighted!’ murmured Sven, making sure his smile went right up to and included his eyes. He had spent a long time practising this smile and had now very nearly got it right. ‘Do, please, sit down and make yourselves at home. There are drinks on the window sill.’ The long, bony hand flapped in the appropriate direction. ‘I wonder – would you excuse frill and myself for a couple of seconds while we have a little whisper together in the corner?’
With Sven and Osmond busy exchanging confidences in the bathroom, Dover started feeling a lot happier. He stretched himself out full length on the bed and watched MacGregor pour out a good stiff whisky. ‘Bit of all right this, eh?’ he queried amiably. ‘Are there any fags in that box? Oh, smashing!’ He helped himself to a handful. ‘This is what I call pushing the boat out!’
MacGregor was less enamoured of the situation. ‘Personally, sir,’ he said as he handed Dover his drink, ‘I prefer to keep well away from Special Branch. You hear some very funny tales about them.’
‘Garn!’ scoffed Dover whose pangs of inter-departmental jealousy were soluble in Scotch. ‘They don’t scare me! They’re nothing but a bunch of lily-livered ponces with all this bloody silly cloak-and-dagger stuff. They’re not what I call real coppers at all.’
‘Perhaps not, sir, but the fact remains that they carry a great deal of weight. What they say goes.’
‘Not where I’m concerned it bloody doesn’t!’ boasted Dover. ‘Hey, quick, give us a refill! They’re coming back.’
Eleven
‘Subversive?’ squealed Dover, although Sven obviously hadn’t finished speaking. ‘You must be joking! All they do is collect bloody postage stamps!’
Sven, now wearing the dark glasses he’d forgotten to put on earlier, remained calm and enigmatic. ‘Things are not always what they seem, Chief Inspector.’
‘Come off it!’ invited Dover. ‘I’ve bloody met ’em! A toe doctor, a potty old woman who breeds goats and What’s-his-name – the fellow who got croaked – a piano tuner. If that’s all that’s threatening the safety of the realm, we can sleep easy at nights. You must have gone barmy!’
Osmond seemed upset. ‘The Dockwra Society is just a cover,’ he explained earnestly. ‘Designed to allow members of the group to maintain contact with each other without arousing suspicion. It’s a technique this bunch use a lot. Almost all their cells function under the disguise of specialised clubs of pigeon fanciers or chess players or nature lovers or something. It happens to be an extremely effective way of running a seditious organisation.’
‘It doesn’t sound effective to me!’ sneered Dover. ‘’Strewth, you’ve apparently infiltrated it easy enough. And you’ve got ’em so well trained they phone you up and warn you the cops are coming.’
Sven leaned forward – a simple movement which seemed to take him ages to accomplish. ‘We have indeed managed to penetrate the innermost recesses of this organisation, Chief Inspector,’ he murmured, ‘but this was by no means easy, not at this level. I doubt if we could do it a second time. Even if we could, it would take years of painstaking effort. That is why my masters’ – he smiled deprecatingly – ‘we are most anxious – adamant, even – that the cover of young Trill here should not be blown. We are dealing with a matter of national security which must, should there at any stage be a conflict of interests, take precedence over the investigation of a mere murder.’
Dover was now sinking into a rather nasty little hollow which his weight had made in the bed and seemed likely to be buried in the assorted detritus he couldn’t help shedding wherever he was. The hollow was gradually but inexorably filling up with cigarette ash, dandruff, fragments of potato crisps, salted peanuts and even the odd trouser button (Mrs Dover being no less fastidious than the rest of us). All in all it was not an edifying sight and Sven might be forgiven for pigeon-holing Dover as an easy pushover. Apart from the evidence of his own eyes, Sven was also fully briefed as to Dover’s past career and achievements. The briefing had been somewhat rushed and superficial but the picture which emerged of a man who was stupid, work-shy, prone to gratuitous violence and probably dishonest was reasonably clear. Some of the fi
ner detail was missing, of course, such as the true story of how, by a series of unhappy incidents, Dover had got himself seconded as a supernumary to the Murder Squad in the first place. Nor was there any account of the tireless but unsuccessful efforts every succeeding Murder Squad commander and Assistant Commissioner (Crime) had made to get rid of him nor of the anguish they experienced when they found that there wasn’t anybody in the entire Metropolitan Police Force who would have him.
What no curriculum vitae could have been expected to reveal, however, and what Sven failed to appreciate is that, although Dover was a right bastard, he was a lucky one. He was a survivor. They might call him Scotland Yard’s most unwanted man. They might complain that he made their posh new headquarters off Victoria Street look untidy. They might claim he had trouble remembering his own name and that he wouldn’t recognise a clue if it jumped and bit him. They might even assert that his usual method of picking out the murderer was by means of a pin, but what they couldn’t deny was that Dover was still there. Hundreds of far better men had fallen by the wayside while he plodded shamefully on – determined to draw his pension or bust. Dover had been bloody-minded from the cradle and he was buggered if he was going to change now.
He eyed Sven with dislike. Toffee-nosed git! ‘What is it this time?’ he demanded. ‘Bloody Reds under the bed again?’
Sven and Osmond exchanged knowing glances.
Sven adjusted his sun glasses. ‘No, not communists as it happens.’
‘The IRA, p’raps?’ guessed Dover, winking violently at MacGregor so that he shouldn’t miss the exquisite humour of these exchanges. ‘Another bunch of thick Micks coming to try and take a rise out of us?’
‘It’s an extreme Right Wing organisation,’ said Sven, slowly unwinding himself and rising to his feet. ‘Very extreme. Very determined. Very cunning.’
Dover blinked. ‘Do you mean that What’s-it-called lot?’ he asked curiously. ‘You know – that bunch Sir Who’s-your-father runs?’
